6 ms·

good on your employee who pulled the plug first and asked questions later-- that's the sign of an organization where people aren't afraid to do the right thing.

good on your employee who pulled the plug first and asked questions later-- that's the sign of an organization where people aren't afraid to do the right thing. very scary situation.

ta1243 2y ago
It's always easy to say good on the employee who acted and stopped the problem The question is what happens with an employee who acted when there wasn't a problem?
- ianlevesque 2y ago
  Layoff. They were costing the company money for irrelevant problems.
  - neilalexander 2y ago
    Congratulations: you've just created a culture where people are afraid to report potential issues for fear of losing their jobs. Maybe there are some cases where you find that specific individuals end up acting irrationally more often than not, but on the whole, it is better to treat these acts as if they were good faith until proven otherwise.
    - Teever 2y ago
      It sounds like the person you're replying to has a future career in QA at Boeing.
      - ianlevesque 2y ago
        I’m saddened the sarcasm flew over the heads here. A disappointing reflection of the number of companies that really do act like that now, which was my point.
        nuancebydefault 2y ago
        Don't be sad. I found out several times myself that irony without emotion hints, misses its goal. Otoh When you add the /s hint, it's more like explaining a joke to a listener.
- red_admiral 2y ago
  The answer from Toyota, where this kind of thing (anyone can stop the assembly line if they think there's a problem) originally came from: if the employee reasonably believed there was a problem, they suffer no consequences (and perhaps even get a merit) for pulling the red cord. Because you lose much more money next time there's a real problem, if no-one dares to stop the machine.
  - fullspectrumdev 2y ago
    This is the correct policy. Many IT security incidents happen because someone’s afraid of raising the alarm. If an employee opens a phishing attachment or something, they should be able to report it without fear of losing their job so the incident can be contained. Instead - they are incentivised to say nothing and hope for the best for fear of getting fired.
- everforward 2y ago
  If yanking the cord on a single system causes losses that are intolerable to the business, the business has serious continuity problems. It was an employee today, but the cord was going to get yanked anyways. A data center tech who pulled the wrong cable out, a power cut, a backhoe with a taste for fiber, whatever. So long as the employee was acting as best they could with the information they had, the resultant business implications are really the businesses' fault. Having a system that cannot be recovered is risky. Assuming that system will never die is foolish. Blaming the employee is pointless. My vote would be to understand why the employee thought it was necessary to shut the system down, and then educate them (and the rest of the department, since it's probably a collective problem) on why it wasn't necessary and what they could have done instead or how they could have known it wasn't an issue. That employee probably also deserves a couple days off once the system is recovered (delivered in person, by their manager). It sends a message that they're not in trouble, but more importantly, they're likely fried from trying to juggle internalizing their mistake, getting the system back up, and worrying they're going to get fired because _this_ is how the CEO learned their name. They probably shouldn't be near a prod system for a couple of days until they've come down from the adrenaline and had some time to internalize what happened.
- igornadj 2y ago
  This is just unnecessary contrarianism.

good on your employee who pulled the plug first and asked questions later-- that's the sign of an organization where people aren't afraid to do the right thing. very scary situation.

ta1243 2y ago

It's always easy to say good on the employee who acted and stopped the problem The question is what happens with an employee who acted when there wasn't a problem?

ianlevesque 2y ago
Layoff. They were costing the company money for irrelevant problems.
- neilalexander 2y ago
  Congratulations: you've just created a culture where people are afraid to report potential issues for fear of losing their jobs. Maybe there are some cases where you find that specific individuals end up acting irrationally more often than not, but on the whole, it is better to treat these acts as if they were good faith until proven otherwise.
  - Teever 2y ago
    It sounds like the person you're replying to has a future career in QA at Boeing.
    - ianlevesque 2y ago
      I’m saddened the sarcasm flew over the heads here. A disappointing reflection of the number of companies that really do act like that now, which was my point.
      - nuancebydefault 2y ago
        Don't be sad. I found out several times myself that irony without emotion hints, misses its goal. Otoh When you add the /s hint, it's more like explaining a joke to a listener.
red_admiral 2y ago
The answer from Toyota, where this kind of thing (anyone can stop the assembly line if they think there's a problem) originally came from: if the employee reasonably believed there was a problem, they suffer no consequences (and perhaps even get a merit) for pulling the red cord. Because you lose much more money next time there's a real problem, if no-one dares to stop the machine.
- fullspectrumdev 2y ago
  This is the correct policy. Many IT security incidents happen because someone’s afraid of raising the alarm. If an employee opens a phishing attachment or something, they should be able to report it without fear of losing their job so the incident can be contained. Instead - they are incentivised to say nothing and hope for the best for fear of getting fired.
everforward 2y ago
If yanking the cord on a single system causes losses that are intolerable to the business, the business has serious continuity problems. It was an employee today, but the cord was going to get yanked anyways. A data center tech who pulled the wrong cable out, a power cut, a backhoe with a taste for fiber, whatever. So long as the employee was acting as best they could with the information they had, the resultant business implications are really the businesses' fault. Having a system that cannot be recovered is risky. Assuming that system will never die is foolish. Blaming the employee is pointless. My vote would be to understand why the employee thought it was necessary to shut the system down, and then educate them (and the rest of the department, since it's probably a collective problem) on why it wasn't necessary and what they could have done instead or how they could have known it wasn't an issue. That employee probably also deserves a couple days off once the system is recovered (delivered in person, by their manager). It sends a message that they're not in trouble, but more importantly, they're likely fried from trying to juggle internalizing their mistake, getting the system back up, and worrying they're going to get fired because _this_ is how the CEO learned their name. They probably shouldn't be near a prod system for a couple of days until they've come down from the adrenaline and had some time to internalize what happened.
igornadj 2y ago
This is just unnecessary contrarianism.